


suddenly alive and nearly smiling

by ABSedarian



Series: Thirty Worlds (AU Challenge) [17]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU Challenge, Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Assassins, Challenge on Infinite Earths, F/F, Falling In Love, Kitchen Sex, Minor Character Deaths, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-11
Updated: 2015-07-11
Packaged: 2018-04-08 20:59:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4320501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ABSedarian/pseuds/ABSedarian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU Challenge / Challenge on Infinite Earths</p>
<p>Day 17: Assassins</p>
<p>Regina Mills has one job to do: kill Emma Swan. But that's not easy when you're falling in love with your target.</p>
            </blockquote>





	suddenly alive and nearly smiling

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Not my characters.
> 
> A/N: Title is taken from a song by one of my favorite bands, The Weakerthans.

You’ve been hunting her for weeks now, watching, waiting, learning her moves, her strengths and weaknesses, her life. Your weapons are always at the ready — one gun in a holster resting under your left arm, another at the small of your back, a small but effective dagger in each of your boots — and all you have to do is kill Emma Swan to claim the quite considerable sum you’ve been promised for the job. 

You’ve been watching, gun in hand, ready to pull the trigger several dozen times. 

You can’t. 

So you follow Emma Swan through the streets of New York and wherever else she goes — to Boston, Philadelphia, Washington — a huntress in her own right, going about her sometimes dirty and dangerous job. You follow her as much as you can, unless you take on other jobs that come up, mostly quick work — go in, kill, claim money. You wish you could follow her all the time, just until the perfect opportunity comes for you to pull the trigger, but you can’t. 

This job is taking over your life. 

You’re there, watching from a fire escape, when a behemoth of a guy gets the drop on Emma in a dimly-lit alley one night in Boston, knocking her unconscious, a large cut on her head. You watch from your perch, hand itching to reach for the gun at your waist, thinking how easy it would be to just end the woman there. 

Perfect opportunity to make it look like a random street crime, perfect opportunity to do the deed and disappear into the night. Or maybe, you think as you watch the thug lift a two-by-four and advance on a prone Emma, you should just let somebody else take care of the problem. It’s not like whoever hired you would care _how_ she died as long as she was dead. 

Before you know that you’ve come to any sort of decision you’re jumping down from the fire escape, landing almost silently a yard behind the thug. Another step has one arm around his neck, a dagger already in your other hand, although you can’t even remember reaching for it. There’s a tiny sound and a soft exhale, then the thug drops to the floor. 

You look from the dead man to your bloody dagger and back, wondering what on earth you’re doing, killing him and not her. Then you shake your head — there’s nothing to be done about it now — clean your knife on his clothes, and drag the guy behind a dumpster. 

You spend long minutes standing over Emma’s body, your dominant hand clenching and unclenching, until the woman stirs and groans as she begins to wake up. You have just enough time to disappear around a corner before Emma opens her eyes. Your fist is still clenched but it’s not because you want to feel a dagger or a gun in it to finish this. It’s because you almost couldn’t stop yourself from leaning down and making sure the injury to Emma’s head wasn’t too bad, or brushing a random lock of hair out of her face. 

You know you’re in trouble even before you’re back in your run-of-the-mill tourist hotel, standing in the shower, leaning against the wall with one hand between your legs, making yourself come with a hoarse cry, imagining Emma’s green eyes looking up from where she’s kneeling in front of you, lips around your clit, three of her fingers inside you, pumping just right, skirting the edge between pleasure and pain. Your orgasm is fierce and fast, and not even close to being satisfying when you open your eyes and find yourself alone. 

It’s not the first time that happens. It’s not even just the second or third. 

And when did you start calling your mark _Emma_ in your head anyway? 

The next morning you’re back in front of Emma’s equally anonymous motel, one hand tracing patterns on the tank of your Triumph, your eyes never leaving the death trap Emma calls a car. If you waited long enough, that coffin on wheels would probably kill her first. 

You straighten, alert, when Emma walks up to her car, your eyes eagerly checking the woman’s face from a distance. There is no trace of blood, and you can see a semi-professional bandage at her temple, which means that Emma either went to a too-busy ER the night before or knows her way around wounds like that well enough to take care of them herself. 

Probably the latter, you think as you follow Emma off the motel parking lot and back to New York, staying so far behind that you can just barely keep her in your sights. Not that it’s hard with that eyesore of a car. 

You’re almost back to the city when your phone rings — it’s the business line — so reluctantly you pull over to check the message. A rush contract, two men, double the money if you can do it within 24 hours, triple if you can make it look like a murder-suicide. You check the information that comes with the offer, and look at the photos that are provided. The money’s too good to pass up, so you agree. 

As you ease back into traffic — hoping against all odds that you’ll catch one more glimpse of the yellow car and the woman in it — you realize that you won’t be seeing Emma until the new job is done. 

You kick your bike into high gear and zip down the freeway, weaving between cars almost at the full speed your bike is capable of. You barely even notice when you pass Emma’s car, trundling along at just over the speed limit, and when you do, you’re already a mile ahead. 

Soon, you think, you’ll get back to the business of killing Emma soon enough. 

o-o-o 

A couple of days later — some park ranger and a weird guy with an eyeliner fetish are now dead in an apparent lovers’ spat, and your Cayman Island bank account has received a huge payout — you follow Emma’s cell phone to a bar in her neighborhood. From the rainbow flag flying over the door you can guess the kind of bar it is, and you’re actually surprised you’ve never been there. 

You consider waiting outside but the night is warm and you’re suddenly in the mood for a drink. You find a seat at the corner of the bar, a wall at your back, full view of the room, just like you prefer. You order a drink from the gorgeous bartender and let your eyes roam over the patrons in the bar, assessing threat levels, which are non-existent apart from the noise level and the fact that the floor looks like it hasn’t been cleaned in a decade. The room is filled to capacity with mostly women — although you can also make out a few guys talking in a corner — and the mood seems friendly and welcoming. 

The only one you don’t see is your mark, and you wonder if you’ve been made and Emma has disappeared through a back door. Given Emma’s job, you consider that a very real possibility — in fact, you’re a little surprised it hasn’t happened earlier with how long you’re taking to kill Emma. 

Then people are shifting. Your eyes zero in on Emma as if drawn there by a magnet, and after two days of not seeing her at all you drink in the sight with hungry eyes. You really need to get a grip on this _feelings_ thing, you think as you down your drink in one gulp, your eyes not straying an inch from Emma’s face. And body. Good God, that body. 

Emma is talking to a woman, a redhead, looking relaxed and carefree, more so than at any other time you’ve seen her. One of her hands is wrapped around a beer bottle, the other is gesturing as she speaks, but then lands on the other woman’s arm, resting there, the movement completely natural as if she’s done it a thousand times. Your eyes narrow at the sight, and you wish it were socially acceptable for you to walk up behind that stranger and just stab her. You’d do it if someone paid you for it, so why not do it for yourself? 

You’re just contemplating the merits of paying yourself to do the job — your eyes glaring at Emma’s hand and the strangers back — when you can feel eyes on you. Your eyes move back to Emma’s face and you’re surprised at the unsettling, powerful feeling as your eyes meet across the bar. You try to tear your eyes away quickly so as not to be even more conspicuous than you already are, but it takes you too damn long. You can see Emma’s eyebrow slowly rising, see the hand drop away from the stranger’s arm as if in slow motion. 

You can’t remember how breathing works until you finally, finally manage to wrench your eyes away from Emma. Your mind takes you back to the thought you woke up with that morning, two fingers inside yourself, on the verge of orgasm. You'd had a dream, so real, real, _real_ , of Emma fucking you against the wall, roughly pumping in and out of your core, thumb pressing rhythmically against your clit, biceps bulging from the strain. It is that image that now has your face flushed in a second, and you can't stop yourself from looking back up in Emma's direction. 

Your eyes meet again, and there's no way it can be mistaken for coincidence this time. Emma's eyes stay glued to you until you have the power to look away again. You flag down the bartender with a bark and order a double, hoping more alcohol will somehow help. You don’t care that you aren’t exactly at your friendliest at that moment. 

The bartender snarls as she slams something down in front of you that looks like no drink you’ve ever had, but you wonder if it matters. It’s alcohol, you’ll drink it. You raise the glass, trying to ignore the strange, strong smell, but before it can touch your lips, a hand on your arm stops you. 

“You don’t want to drink that,” Emma Swan says, standing next to you, so close that you can smell her hair, her skin. It robs you of your breath. 

It’s possible that drink already killed half your brain cells just from its smell because you just keep staring at her until you finally manage a croaky, “I’m sorry?” after what feels like the most awkward minute of your life. 

“You will be, if you drink that.” Emma points at the glass in your hand. “Did you manage to piss off Ruby?” 

“Who is Ruby?” You’re hoping it’s not the stranger you’ve just killed twenty different ways in your head. 

Emma points at the bar. “ _That’s_ Ruby. She owns this place.” She shoots the bartender a friendly smile. “She’s great but if you do something she doesn’t like, she’ll fix you a drink that’ll make you sick like a dog.” 

You set the glass down carefully, as if jostling its contents will make it explode. You’ve handled TNT, you know the drill. “I’m not sure what—“ 

“You’ve been watching me,” Emma states confidently. 

And here it is. You ready yourself for an ugly confrontation right inside this bar. If Emma really knows, then ending her right here is the worst way you could have handled this contract. One hand slowly moves to the back of your pants where one of your gun sits patiently waiting in its holster. 

Your face must have shown some of your apprehension because Emma actually takes half a step back and raises her hands. “Hey, I just came over to talk,” she says quickly. “I saw you look at me when I was talking to my friend, and you looked interesting a-and interested since you were glaring at Belle, so I thought …” She shrugs adorably once her rambling trails off, and Regina relaxes minutely. "You're shy, huh?" 

“Sorry,” you say again, sure that you’ve never apologized to a mark before. At least not to their face, and definitely not more than once. “Maybe I am. I don't usually do this kind of thing.” It's not a lie, you’ve never thought about fucking a mark in your dreams almost every night. You’ve also never been made — or picked up by one in a bar. You’re really not sure which of the two this is. 

Emma's smile is sweet. “So ... can I interest you in a drink?” she asks. "With me, I mean?" 

Your face relaxes a little more, and a small smirk settles around your mouth. “I might be persuaded unless I’m invading somebody’s territory.” Not that you’d give a fuck, and getting Emma drunk — and maybe getting a little drunk right along with her — may make killing her easier, fewer defenses to deal with and all that. “Won’t your … _friend_ mind?” 

Emma shakes her head and laughs. “Belle? No,” she replies quickly. “But that might have been what pissed Ruby off, you know … the fact that you were throwing daggers at her wife’s back with your eyes …” 

“I wasn’t,” you protest, and it comes out a little weakly. “I was just … lost in my own thoughts.” 

Emma hums. “If you say so.” Her fingers suddenly dance across your arm, and you try hard not to tense under the unexpected touch. “So you’re not interested?” 

“I didn’t say that,” you drawl. “I’m a little wary of your friend’s drinks, though …” 

It’s a large enough hint. “Wanna get out of here?” 

You nod before your sense of self-preservation can interfere. “Any ideas?” 

Emma bites her lip, causing your desire to flare brightly. “My apartment’s not too far from here,” she suggests. “I'm Emma, by the way." 

You put a twenty on the bar and bite your tongue hard before you blurt out something incredibly idiotic like _I know._ You remain silent, _barely_ , but Emma doesn’t seem to mind that you’re not even giving her your name. You could give her a false one, you think, but you don’t really want to hear anything but your own name coming from those lips, and that is a risk you’re not willing to take. Not yet. 

The walk to Emma’s apartment is short and silent, and you spend the time walking half a step behind Emma, one hand on the gun at your back, trying to talk yourself into ending her before you take this too far. Unfortunately for you, Emma stops in front of her building too soon for you to make up your mind. Your hand falls from the gun as you follow Emma up the stairs with a mixture of excitement, desire, and apprehension. 

You have a feeling that the only way this can go is wrong. So, so wrong. But why then does it feel so right? So inevitable? 

Once you’re inside the apartment, small but well-furnished and clean, which you appreciate, Emma heads for the open kitchen to get those drinks she promised while you excuse yourself to the bathroom to get rid of your arsenal. You take off your boots, making sure that the daggers aren’t easily visible, then you remove your leather jacket as well. You slip out of the shoulder holster and unclip the gun and holster from the back of your belt and roll up both inside the jacket. On your way to the kitchen you drop your stuff next to the front door, before facing Emma with a smile you can only hope isn’t as awkward as you’re beginning to feel once more. 

“Drink?” There’s a glass in front of your face filled with three fingers worth of clear liquid. “Don’t worry, it’s just vodka.” 

You hum in appreciation as you take a sip. It’s the good stuff. “Nice,” you say, and you don’t think you’ve ever uttered a one-syllable sentence with such flirtatious undertones before. What on earth is this women doing to you? 

Apparently, you also have an effect on Emma because her eyes widen at your tone, then turn dark and hungry. Before you can brace yourself, she’s on you, and you find yourself pressed between Emma’s body and the kitchen counter, her mouth fierce and passionate against your lips. There’s nothing tentative about the kiss, no gentle first touch, no cautious testing of the waters. No, Emma Swan dives right in, making you gasp, and that’s all the invitation she needs to deepen the kiss, teasing your tongue with hers. The glass in your hand tumbles to the countertop behind you as you try to brace yourself against it, sloshing clear liquid over the rim and your fingers. 

Your response is slow at first but once you get over the surprise, you return the kiss with equal passion, meeting Emma stroke for stroke, moan for moan. You pull in a desperate breath through your nostrils as your heart rate increases after skipping a few beats at the first touch of her lips on yours. Then Emma’s hand is on your breast, kneading, stroking, and you break away from the kiss with a gasp that morphs into a groan when she pinches your nipple which already feels hard enough to poke through your shirt. 

“You’re _not_ the shy type, aren’t you?” you ask breathlessly. 

Emma smirks, looking even more infuriatingly attractive. “Too much?” It’s a rhetorical question given your response to her kiss and her touch, and she knows it. 

“Not even close,” you growl, pulling her back into another kiss. Your body is heating up, and you crave her closeness, her touch, her kisses. You have no thoughts of knives or guns or killing her, only of lips and hands, and making her scream, of blowing her mind in the best possible way, just like she’s blowing yours with the way her lips move over your mouth, and her tongue teases your upper lip before gently but surely tasting yours. 

Emma seems to have similar ideas as she steps even closer to you, making you spread your legs a little more to make room for her. She’s still in her boots, which makes her just a couple of inches or so taller than you, just enough for you to have to lean back a little to kiss her comfortably. Emma notices, maybe, because the next thing you know her hands are at the back of your thighs and she has lifted you onto the counter, pressing her hips to yours in the same suave move. 

You can’t help the moan that escapes your throat at the feel of her body so intimately close to yours, and for a wild moment you wish you could just vanish your clothes with a wave of your hand. Or at least have worn a skirt. A very short skirt. 

But you didn’t. “This … isn’t going to work,” you pant between kisses, the ache between your legs getting quite pronounced now. You want to feel her, want her hands on you everywhere, but mostly where you really need her right now. You want your dreams to come true. It’s astounding how crazy she’s making you just with her kisses and the skillful way she teases your nipples through the silk of your shirt and the lace of your bra. A few more minutes of this and the dry-humping you’ve got going on, and you might come without ever experiencing her touch on your skin. 

“Oh, sure it is,” comes Emma’s confident reply, before her mouth starts a slow descent along your jaw and throat towards the opening of your shirt. She opens the top two buttons with swift fingers, revealing your bra, her mouth following every newly-unveiled inch of skin with hot, wet licks, marking your skin with a trail of fire. When her lips close around a nipple, and her tongues flicks it through the layer of lace, you almost come on the spot. You’ve been dreaming of this for months, but the real thing is so much better than anything you’ve imagined. 

Emma’s hand continues its way down your front until it hits the barrier of your belt. She surges up to kiss you again, maybe to divert your attention, because once her lips move back to your collarbone, your belt is undone, your pants are unbuttoned and unzipped, allowing Emma to see your black lace panties, if she only deigned to look. As it is, her eyes are locked on yours, dark and lustful, even as her right hand teases the lacy lingerie. 

“Is this what you want?” Emma asks before really touching you, pausing with just the tips of her fingers inside the waistband of your panties. “Can I touch you?” 

You can’t get any words out, so you nod furiously, adding a groan when her fingers move lower and lower until the tips are pressed right against your opening. 

“Do you even know how wet you are?” Emma asks, and you’re happy to hear that her voice is strained as well. “How good you feel? All silky and hot … and so, so wet for me.” 

You can’t take it any longer. “Inside, now,” you order, your voice as low as you’ve ever heard it. “Fuck me.” 

Emma’s grin is slightly evil, which only serves to make it very sexy in your eyes. “Your wish is my command.” With that, she pushes her hand deeper into your panties, entering you with one swift thrust. You’re so wet you can’t tell if she uses two or three fingers, but it also doesn’t really matter. It’s good, it’s just what you need, hot and hard, despite the lack of space. You both know this is going to be fast, _has_ to be fast due to the position, and Emma does her very best to make you come without much fanfare, which is exactly what you need right now. 

You shimmy your hips on the countertop moving as close to the edge as you can, spreading your legs as far as your clothed state allows, curling them around her hips and hooking your ankles behind Emma’s ass to give her the maximum amount of room for her hand. She makes good use of it, managing to steady your rather precarious position by hooking her free arm around the small of your back and pressing her lower body to your front, knees against the cabinets, keeping you at the edge and giving her thrusts more power. Her biceps are bulging with the strain she’s putting her arms through, and it’s that sight as much as what her hand is doing to you with its rhythmic in and out, and a thumb circling on your clit, that has you close to coming in no time flat. 

When Emma curls her fingers a little more, hitting just the right spot again and again, and moves her mouth to one of your nipples, biting it through the fabric of your bra, you come with a howl, your whole body trembling in her hold, head banging into the cabinet behind you, legs falling from around her body, every muscle feeling like it’s been turned into jelly. 

Emma keeps her hand inside you, thumb still lightly pressing on your clit, fingers moving _just_ a little inside you, guiding you through your orgasm. You wrap your hands in her hair and pull her face up, needing to kiss her, to feel her lips, to breathe her in, even if you can barely draw breath with your heart threatening to hammer its way out of your chest. 

Emma moves willingly, and the kiss surprises you with its tenderness. You didn’t expect that, didn’t expect the gentleness with which her mouth caresses yours, and you’re mortified when your eyes fill with tears at the thought of what could have been under different circumstances. 

You part after only a few short moments when Emma winces into the kiss. She slowly withdraws her hand from inside your body, then your pants, moving it straight to her mouth to taste you. Your faces are so close that the smell of your own arousal coating her fingers hits you full force, and before your brain can kick in, you’re kissing her around your fingers, sharing the taste, making you both moan low in your throats. 

Once her hand is clean Emma leans heavily against you, her forehead on your shoulder, breathing you in but otherwise still, eyes closed, and you wonder what’s going on inside her head. “Look at me,” you plead softly. 

She lifts her head and you almost gasp at the burning desire you can see in her eyes when they meet yours. You cup her cheek, stroking her face with your thumb, until she turns her head and presses a kiss to your palm. Your breath catches in your throat as the situation becomes clearer and clearer to you: this is so much more than just scratching an itch. This is more than you fulfilling your dreams, of you getting her out of your system so you can end your fucking mission. This is about two people finding each other against all odds — and you _ending_ your mission, just a different way. 

You have to find a different way. 

Tomorrow. For now, you’d be happy just to finally feel her against you, make her feel what she just made you feel. Tomorrow you can figure out what to do about everything else. 

“Thank you,” you whisper, ever the polite lover, pressing a tender kiss to her lips. “Can we get naked now so I can return the favor?” 

To your surprise Emma sighs and takes a step back, causing you to almost fall off the counter. Without her warmth, her closeness, you feel ridiculous, sitting there with your shirt half undone and your pants wide open. “Emma?” 

“I know who you are,” Emma whispers. “I know what you are … I just couldn’t help myself and I figured if I’m still alive, there must be a reason, right?” 

Her words don’t compute, not even a little. _What? How?_

Emma sees the confusion in your eyes. “I’ve been warned,” she answers the unasked question. “I think by the same person who is behind your contract. And they offered to pay me the same money they offered you, if I take you out first.” 

“What are you …” You stop. None of this is making any sense to you, and that has nothing to do with the way your brain just short-circuited during your orgasm. You become horribly aware of your vulnerable position but Emma doesn’t even seem to notice. 

“I’ve been watching you for months now,” she continues softly. “Just like you watched me. When you weren’t following me, I was following you. Thank you for saving my life in Boston the other night, by the way.” 

You shake your head, trying to clear the fog from your brain. “Why am I still alive?” you rasp. 

“Why am _I_ still alive?” she replies, and you both know the answer is the same. “Just answer me one question,” she demands, and her voice is hoarse. 

You have no idea what’s going to come out of her mouth but you nod anyway. What have you got to lose at this point? “Anything.” 

Emma reaches across the space separating you to rest her hand on the side of your face. “Once you have me naked and thoroughly sated like I know I will be if I let you touch me … will you finally kill me, Regina?” 

You lean your head into her hand and press a kiss against the palm, mirroring her gesture from only minutes before. Then you shake your head once. “Will _you_?” 

Emma’s reply is to help you off the counter, steadying you as your feet hit the cold tile floor, and leading you to her bedroom. You make it as far as the doorframe before she's on you again, and you both start tearing at clothes between almost desperate kisses. 

You need two more attempts to actually make it to the bed — the wall and a dresser happen to be more convenient along the way — but when you do, it's wonderful. And if she decides to kill you in your sleep after all … well, you'll consider it a good way to go. 

**The End**


End file.
